Ed Gillespie on Drugs

Opposes decriminalization, but align penalty to pot offense

Democratic Lt. Gov. Ralph Northam became the first gubernatorial candidate to publicly announce his support for decriminalizing marijuana. While Northam was the first candidate to support decriminalization, he's not the only one who wants to open up the
state's marijuana laws. Tom Perriello's spokesman said that Perriello also would support decriminalizing marijuana. "Yes, of course. And as he has said consistently during his campaign, we have to fix our broken criminal justice system and re-engineer
the school to prison pipeline into a school to workforce pipeline. This includes reforming our outdated and often racially biased drug laws," the spokesman said.

Former Republican National Committee Chairman Ed Gillespie's campaign said in
a statement that while Gillespie opposes marijuana legalization or decriminalization, "he does support exploring reforms to make sure that penalties align appropriately to the offense committed."